The Seybold Report on Desktop Publishing articles from May 1993

The Seybold Report on Desktop Publishing archives from May 1993

Toward better color on the desktop: Leaf's HDR scanner proposal. (Leaf Systems Inc.'s High Dynamic Range technology)(summary of feature article)
May 3, 1993... Until recently, it was a given that desktop file formats for scanned images were limited to eight bits per primary color, i.e., 24-bit color for rgb data or 32-bit color for cmyk data. There have been good reasons for this: eight bits fit...

CD-ROM medium: coming of age at last. (summary of feature article)
May 3, 1993... The strength of cd-rom is that it is a wonderfully cheap distribution medium for almost any kind of data. On the other hand, it's neither fast nor updatable. But that hasn't stopped the computer industry from hatching a wide range of schemes to...

Leaf HDR: remaking the color high end on the desktop. (Leaf Systems Inc.'s High Dynamic Range technology)(includes related articles on color spaces and a glossary of imaging terminology)
May 3, 1993... Desktop color is about to get another big boost, if Leaf Systems has its way. By combining techniques from the medical industry with some new thoughts about image handling, Leaf has put forth an interesting product concept called High Dynamic...

Seybold seminars '93: view from the desktop. (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Highlights in fonts, graphics, digital communications, color, output, etc. As announced previously, our full coverage of this year's Seybold Seminars in Boston April 13-16 will be contained in a Special Report to be published later this...

ElseWare joins font technology competition. (ElseWare Corp.'s Infinifont technology)(Seybold Seminars 1993) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... The annual Font Free-for-All saw the emergence of a new font-substitution technology called Infinifont. It will compete with Ares Software' FontChameleon and Adobe's Super ATM. The new contender comes from ElseWare, whose Panose font-numbering...

Illustration and paint programs converge. (Seybold Seminars 1993)
May 3, 1993... A new breed of graphics packages, offering both vector and paint-type tools, has emerged. It began sprouting this spring at the Seybold Seminars and will come into full bloom this summer. The key is the enormous amount of new functionality...

Color: Leaf proposes new scanning standard. (Leaf Systems Inc.'s High Dynamic Range technology)(Seybold Seminars 1993)
May 3, 1993... Action was heavy on a variety of color fronts, including color retouching systems, scanning and related areas, output, and color management. Scanning. In the scanning area, Leaf Systems introduced its HDR (High Dynamic Range) concept, which...

Quark, Xtensions and XChange's 20 more. (Seybold Seminars 1993)
May 3, 1993... XChange, which had one of the busiest booths at the show, now features about 150 Xtensions in its bag of tricks, most of which were available for display at the show. We found more than 20 new ones, from which we will highlight these. (See our...

Page layout. (Serif Software Ltd.'s PagePlus 2.0) (Seybold Seminars 1993)(Brief Article) (Product Announcement)
May 3, 1993... There was precious little news on the page layout front. We had all seen PageMaker 5.0 and Xpress 3.2. The main excitement came from Serif's new PagePlus 2.0, a mixture of terrific and terrible functionality at a shocking $59.95 price point....

Electronic delivery of documents. (Seybold Seminars 1993)
May 3, 1993... Our notion of what is a document is undergoing radical attack as we employ multimedia and other nontraditional technologies to the document creation and distribution process. Michael Sullivan of Imprimatur pointed out that our paradigm changes...

Document management among open systems. (Seybold Seminars 1993)
May 3, 1993... Document management and workflow is the last great frontier in publishing in most market segments. Compounding the problem is the cornucopia of applications and data types that need be integrated and managed. These sessions both sketched out...

Color output. (Seybold Seminars 1993)
May 3, 1993... In the Quintar booth, Metrum demonstrated a new line of FotoPrint digital color printers using the QScript 2000 controller. The first model, called the Metrum QS-2000, uses a special, light-sensitive paper and a crt light source to produce...

High-resolution: new screening wars erupt. (Seybold Seminars 1993) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... In the output arena, excitement centered on a new bout of screening wars that erupted when Agfa and Linotype-Hell announced development of a technology based on random placement of dots rather than halftone cells. Called stochastic screening or...

Other output issues. (Seybold Seminars 1993) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Servers. Archetype offered a new version of InterSep, its opi/dcs-compatible image management software for Apple's new Workgroup Server 95 running under aux (in contrast to Compumation's Color Central servers, which run under the Mac os). The...

Other items. (DayStar's Charger ASIC chip) (Seybold Seminars 1993) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... DayStar featured its Charger asic chip that incorporates several different technologies in addition to including Photoshop filters. It is Storm compatible and will accelerate Picture Press as well.

AIIM offers snapshot of imaging industry. (Association for Information and Image Management 1993 show and conference)
May 3, 1993... Current state of affairs mirrors other parts of computer industry As in past years, this year's annual Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM) show and conference presented the latest in document imaging. Held last month in...

Approaches to document imaging.
May 3, 1993... The document image management industry has a number of recurrent marketing themes that have remained fairly stable during the last two years or so as imaging has been drawing more attention to itself. Image enabling. The first document...

Calera announces new OCR technology. (Calera Recognition Systems announces Adaptive Recognition Technology for its M/Series optical character recognition systems) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Adaptive Recognition Technology to debut in Calera's M series Calera Recognition Systems has announced a new ocr technology that it claims improves recognition of degraded documents and cuts recognition errors by 35% over its previous...

Calera mainstreams its OCR products. (Calera Recognition Systems Inc.'s WordScan and WordScan Plus Optical Character Recognition software)
May 3, 1993... Calera has reduced the price of its WordScan and WordScan Plus ocr software 30-40 percent. Calera says the move is designed to bring its ocr products to the mainstream market in line with falling scanner and fax card prices. The prices,...

PixelCraft adds Sharp to scanner line. (QuickScan image acquisition software to be bundled with Sharp JX-610 color scanner) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... PixelCraft recently announced that it will bundle QuickScan, its image acquisition software, with Sharp's JX-610 color scanner, marking the first time the firm will be selling scanners manufactured by an oem. The bundle for the Mac will cost...

Savitar upgrades ScanMatch; new version supports slide scanners. (ScanMatch 2.0 scanner calibration software)(Brief Article) (Product Announcement)
May 3, 1993... Savitar has released version 2.0 of its ScanMatch scanner calibration software. This version's new features include support for both slide and flatbed scanners, improved color matching, specialized photographic targets for scanning and...

Spinnaker buys Power Up Software. (Spinnaker Software Corp.) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Spinnaker Software Corp. signed a letter of intent to acquire Power Up Software, a vendor of low-end desktop publishing software and personal organization programs. In exchange, Power Up's stockholders will get cash and warrants to buy...

Umax releases OCR, new scanners. (Umax Technologies Inc.'s ReadStation, ScanOffice and UC840 Optical Character Recognition scanners)(Brief Article) (Product Announcement)
May 3, 1993... Umax Technologies has introduced three new products for ocr and desktop publishing users. ReadStation is an intelligent reading machine that integrates ocr and scanning. Completely self-contained, ReadStation does not require a dedicated pc....

SuperMac buys E-Machines. (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... SuperMac has purchased the E-Machines product line and rights to all future products. According to MacWeek, E-Machines will be restructured as a technology development unit for SuperMac. The acquisition pares down the competition in the video...

Trumatch patent award. (U.S. patent 5,174,758 for digital four-color matching system) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Trumatch has been granted U.S. patent 5,174,758 on its digital four-color matching system. In brief, Trumatch starts with 50 hues that are distributed uniformly around the perceptual spectrum. Each of these basis colors can be lightened by...

Xerox Imaging Systems. (client/server ScanWorx Optical Character Recognition software)(Brief Article) (Product Announcement)
May 3, 1993... Xerox Imaging Systems is shipping the client/server implementation of its ScanWorx ocr software that enables ocr capabilities to be accessed by Macs, pcs and Unix workstations on the same network. The software sells for $1,995 and additional...

NewGen adds 1,200-dpi printer. (NewGen Systems Corp.'s ImagerPlus 12)(Brief Article) (Product Announcement)
May 3, 1993... NewGen has added a 1,200x1,200-dpi, 11-inchx17-inch plain-paper printer to its line. Called the ImagerPlus 12 and based on Toshiba's A-655 engine, it was demonstrated at the CeBit show in Germany in March and is available now for $7,495. It...

LaserMaster cuts WinPrint prices. (WinPrinter line of computer printers) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... LaserMaster has reduced prices on its entire line of WinPrint printers, which have been optimized for Windows printing performance. The 600XL (600 dpi, 11-inchx17-inch) has been cut from $3,695 to $2,495; the 800 (800 dpi, 4 ppm, letter) from...

Dataproducts drops prices. (Jolt PS and LZR 965 printers) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Dataproducts has cut the price of its Jolt PS solid-ink color printer from $6,695 to $4,995 and its 600-dpi LZR 965 from $2,995 to $2,445. Both units support Adobe PostScript Level 2.

PacificPage 4 for LaserJet 4. (Pacific Data Products Inc.)(Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... Pacific Data Products has added PacificPage 4 with PostScript emulation to its capabilities for LaserJet 4 printers. It is a simm module that is installed into one of the four memory slots to take advantage of the printer's internal i960 risc...

SunPics enhances NewsPrint. (NewsPrint 2.5)(Brief Article) (Product Announcement)
May 3, 1993... SunPics has announced the availability of version 2.5 of its NewsPrint software for Solaris 2 printers. It enables users in heterogeneous computing networks to print PostScript files from Macintosh, Windows and dos computers, as well as Sun and...

Seybold awards for excellence. (Seybold Seminars '93)
May 3, 1993... The second annual Seybold Awards for Excellence were given to exceptional products exhibited in the New Products Showcase. Eleven winners were chosen for their significant contributions to the advancement of the computer publishing industry or...

Digital communications. (telecommunications session at conference) (Seybold Seminars '93) (Brief Article)
May 3, 1993... The telecommunication session at Seybold Seminars 93 brought together three different perspectives on the uses for the new high-bandwidth digital communications infrastructure now being deployed. Tom Edrington, vp of Raynet, gave his vision...